


I Dare You

by saturn181



Category: SKAM Austin
Genre: F/F, Gen, Getting Together, Internalized Homophobia, LGBTQ Character, Pining, shay pov
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-25
Updated: 2018-08-10
Packaged: 2019-06-16 02:36:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15427176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saturn181/pseuds/saturn181
Summary: All of a sudden, their faces were so close together that Shay could see all the little individual flakes of black mascara that had settled on her cheekbones. Maybe it was a side effect of the low light, but it seemed like Megan was staring at her with a strange, fervent look in her eyes. You could cut the tension between them with a knife.Megan let out a low whisper, “Do you want to make out with me, Shay?”Shay was perfectly happy with her life. Well, maybe she wouldn't go so far as to sayhappy, but she was certainly content. She'd go to school, hang out with her friends, go to band practice, do all her homework, and try to ignore Megan. Rinse and repeat. That is, until one eventful Saturday night throws her perfectly ordered world into disarray.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I originally got the idea to start this fic from the scene in OG Skam season two where Vilde and Eva kiss at that party - I thought that in the Austin adaption, it would make sense for Shay and Megan to be the ones making out in that scene. I hope you all enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it!
> 
> Also, the title for this fic comes from a song by The XX of the same name which makes me think of Shay and Megan every time I listen to it.

Barely ten minutes after she’d set foot in that house, Shay decided she could happily go the rest of her life without ever going to another football party. This was nothing like the relaxed summer nights she’d spent with Marlon and Tyler, splitting a pizza and getting comfortably tipsy off cheap premixed whiskey and cola after band practice. There was a competitive edge to the atmosphere of the football party, an unspoken pressure to be cooler than everyone else that made it impossible to fully relax and have fun. Boring top 40 song after boring top 40 song thumped relentlessly through the house as Shay leaned against the wall, reluctantly sipping warm, cheap beer and tapping her fingers rhythmically across the plasterboard, trying not to look at Megan. Which was proving to be damn near impossible.

Over the long, drawn-out summer, the times she saw Megan had become few and far between and Shay had almost managed to convince herself that she was over it. That her feelings were just a flighty crush, and they had barely been there in the first place. But as soon as Megan sauntered into school on the first day of term in that little blue sundress, looking like a goddamn Disney princess with her thick, dark ponytail bouncing behind her, Shay knew she was in deep - her mind was saturated with Megan. It was like she’d had a magnet attached to her head or something, her eyes where inexplicably and uncontrollably drawn to wherever Megan was. She looked especially cute tonight, dressed up in a denim skirt and silky black velvet top, black eyeshadow smudged across her lids in a dark smokey eye. As much as Shay was trying to ignore her, she instinctively looked over at Megan every so often, who had been steadily downing alcopops and taking to the dance floor with increased sloppiness all night.

“Dude, how much longer do you think we have to stay before it’s socially acceptable to leave?” Tyler slid into the space beside her, leaning against the wall and looking almost as uncomfortable as Shay felt. He had good reason, too - that Josefina girl had been making flirty eyes at him since they got there.  
“I don’t know,” sighed Shay. “I guess it depends on when Marlon wants to leave, he’s our ride home.”  
“Yeah…” Tyler replied distractedly. He was glancing covetly across the room, and Shay followed his gaze to where Josefina was standing in a huddle of girls on the other side of the dance floor. Her heavy lidded eyes cut daggers through the smokey air and she was chewing seductively on the neck of her bottle like her life depended on it, not breaking eye contact with Tyler. It was no wonder he felt uncomfortable, the girl was straight up unnerving - although Shay had to admit that she admired her confidence.  
“Where is that bitch boy anyway?” Tyler snapped his attention back to their conversation, pointedly avoiding eye contact with Josefina.  
Shay was still staring across the room at the group of girls. Surely Megan would be standing over there with her friends, but she was nowhere to be found. Come to think of it, Shay hadn’t seen Megan in the last fifteen minutes or so (not that she was counting). Where had she gone?  
“Shay!” Tyler clicked his fingers impatiently in front of her face. “Hello?”  
“What?” She scowled, tearing her gaze off the dancefloor.  
“What is with you tonight dude, you’re acting so spaced out. Are you okay? Are you drunk, Shay?” An edge of banter crept into Tyler’s voice as he smirked at her expectantly.  
“No, I’m _fine_ , I’m not drunk.” She shoved him playfully. “I’m just tired, that’s all.”  
“Okay, then, have you seen Marlon?” he replied.  
“Nah, not since he disappeared with that Kittens girl.”  
Both Shay and Tyler had mocked Marlon mercilessly for punching way above his weight when he started flirting with another girl - a _senior_ \- from the dance team. They thought there was no way in hell she would ever go for him, but for all the crap he talked about the ‘toxic nature of American sports culture’, Marlon still had some kind of unexplainable, seductive power over the girls on the dance team. The last Shay had seen of him, he was ducking off into some shady corner with said Kittens girl, leaving her and Tyler to endure the rest of this boring football party on their own.  
“Well, I guess I’ll go and find him myself.” Tyler rolled his eyes. “Oh, and I heard this guy before saying he had tequila, I might try get some off him and we can do shots?”  
Shay downed the last dregs of her sub-standard beer and crunched the can in her hand.  
“Why not?” she shrugged. Maybe these types of parties got more bearable the drunker you got. “And, hey, do you mind taking this to the trash for me? Thanks.”  
Before he could resist, she chucked the empty can into Tyler’s arms and he stuck the finger up at her.  
“Dipshit,” he muttered as he sloped off into the crowd. “Later.”

With no one to talk to and not even a drink to distract her, Shay was finding it more and more of a struggle to fight the urge to scan the crowd for Megan again. The desire was like an itch screaming out to be scratched - the more she tried to ignore it, the more it seemed to wholly occupy her mind. Floundering for distractions, she pulled her phone out of her pocket. Maybe by the time she finished scrolling through her Instagram feed, Tyler would return with either Marlon, ready to drive them home, or tequila. She wasn’t fussy, either of them would make her life infinitely easier. She jammed the home button of her phone down a few times with increasing impatience to no avail, and even whacked the phone frustratedly against her thigh before conceding defeat - her battery was dead. Of course it was. _Perfect,_ she thought sardonically, _the cherry on top of a fucking delightful evening._

Giving up all pretense, Shay allowed herself another quick glance around the room, but Megan was still conspicuously absent. Maybe there was a long line at the bathroom, or something? A tiny hint of doubt had started to wriggle in Shay’s stomach. Meg had been looking pretty sloppy the last time Shay saw her, what if there was something seriously wrong? It couldn’t hurt to just go and check up on her, at least. What if Megan was passed out somewhere in a corner, or what if she needed to be saved from some creepy football guy trying to make a move on her? _It was the right thing to do, the sensible thing to do_ , Shay assured herself, _to go and make sure she was okay_. Deep down she knew her excuse was flimsy as hell, but she quashed the voice of reason in her head and decided to go and find Megan. It would just be for a minute or two, it couldn’t hurt. Shay’s head swam, her thoughts circling in a hazy, confusing blur. Maybe she was starting to get a little bit drunk, after all. As she stood up off the wall the room seemed to rock back and forth slightly, and she had barely taken two steps forward before a sweaty set of arms slung around her neck and a heavy weight plunged into her grasp.

“Shayyy,” Megan slurred sweetly, flashing a dopey, heavy-lidded grin up at her. “Look Grace, look, it’s Shay!”  
Shay felt her stomach plummet straight to the floor. _Megan was hugging her._ Megan was currently, more accurately, slung around Shay like her life depended on it, her head lolling against Shay’s chest as she stumbled in her platform boots. Shay’s heart thudded heavily against her ribcage.  
“Uhh, hi,” she managed to stammer. It wasn’t fair for Megan to just spring herself on Shay like this out of the blue. She needed time to emotionally prepare for this level of physical contact, for God’s sake!  
“I’m sorry about all this,” Grace sighed in a long-suffering tone, gesturing vaguely at Megan. “But would you mind just looking after her for a few minutes? I’ve really got to go and take care of something, and I don’t want to leave her on her own. I’ll be back to get her before you know it.”  
“I, uh, I mean...” Shay stuttered, floundering to try and find an excuse to turn her down. Being around a drunk Megan was probably more than she could handle at the moment. “I can, but -”  
“Great!” Grace cut her off, already backing away from them. “I’ll be back soon, just make sure she doesn’t do anything stupid.”

 _Make sure she doesn’t do anything stupid. For fuck’s sake,_ thought Shay, _what is that supposed to mean?_ A distant, pinching sensation was starting to tingle in the back of her head, and the pounding music suddenly seemed deafeningly loud. Megan swung her arm heavily around Shay’s shoulders and hung like a dead weight against her side.  
“Shay… Shay… Shaydee,” she mused aimlessly, dropping her head to lean against Shay’s shoulder. “Howsst goin’, Shaydee?” The sentence was a slurred mish-mash of words, spoken like a single syllable.  
“Okay Megs,” Shay replied slowly, “Let’s go get you a glass of water, or something. Come on, up you get.”  
She slunk an arm around Megan’s waist, trying to ignore how the whole side of her body that was pressed against Megan felt like it was on fire, and pulled her upright, dragging her in the direction of the kitchen. It was hard work - Megan seemed entirely unwilling to move as she planted her stumbling feet stubbornly into the floor.  
“Nooo,” she wailed, pulling on Shay’s hands. “I wanna daaaance! Come dance with me, Shay, come on!”

How was she supposed to resist that? It was like time slowed down when Megan danced. There was something so captivating about the way she moved - the noise of the party faded to a distant buzz around them and all Shay could see was her, her movements as fluid as water, illuminated against the dancefloor. Shay bobbed her head to the beat half-heartedly, but she barely even heard what song was playing. Even though all she did was thrash her head side to side and wave her arms wildly in the air, Megan managed to make even drunk dancing look spectacular. The way she managed to wholly capture Shay’s imagination was absolutely not fair. It should have probably been illegal. She was almost definitely a witch, or something, surely no normal person could possess that much power.

The moment of rapture barely lasted thirty seconds (although to Shay it felt more like several sunlit days) before Megan tripped over her own feet and fell back onto Shay, looping her arms around her neck and giggling tipsily.  
“D’you wanna know what I just saw?” Megan said in an exaggerated whisper, a judgemental tone edging into her voice. “I was at the bathroom and guess what? I saw _Marlon_ making out with that girl, y’know, _Ayesha_ , from the Kittens.” She rolled each individual syllable of the name off her tongue contemptuously. A - ye - sha. “Like, what the fuck? We just broke up like, two seconds ago and he’s already _throwing_ himself at any random girl he can find! Isn’t that crazy?”  
Shay was still trying to shake the image of Megan dancing out of her mind, and it was a few moments before she realised Megan was looking at her expectantly for a response.  
“Oh! Yeah… Yeah, fuck him, that’s so messed up.” Part of her vaguely registered that she should probably feel happy for her best friend, he’d been chasing that Ayesha girl for weeks. But she’d sooner sacrifice her entire friendship with Marlon than disagree with Megan when she was so fired up about something, even if she’d barely remember their conversation the next morning.  
“It’s sooo unfair!” Megan pouted. “He’s out there making out with some girl, and I’m not making out with _anyone._ I broke up with him, he shouldn’t be winning right now.”  
“I, uhh…” Shay struggled to try and find a reply that would placate her. She was desperate to move the topic away from Marlon, but somehow all her conversations with Megan eventually circled back to this point. “I’m sure that’s not how he -”  
“I need to find someone to make out with too.” Megan cut her off, looking wildly around the crowd as if the perfect hook-up candidate would suddenly materialise in front of her.  
The room had suddenly started to feel very hot. Shay was finding it increasingly hard to breathe - she took quick, shallow breaths and her heart was pounding so hard against her chest that she was sure it was about to shatter her ribcage. Was it just her imagination, or had Megan managed to move even closer to her? All of a sudden, their faces were so close together that Shay could see all the little individual flakes of black mascara that had settled on her cheekbones. Maybe it was a side effect of the low light, but it seemed like Megan was staring at her with a strange, fervent look in her eyes. You could cut the tension between them with a knife.  
Megan let out a low whisper, “Do you want to make out with me, Shay?”

There was no way this could really be happening. Had Shay fallen somewhere and hit her head? Had she passed out and woken up in some kind of strange fever hallucination? _Do you want to make out with me, Shay?_ The voice sounded far off and disconnected, like she was trying to listen to Megan from underwater. Somewhere in the distance someone changed the music, and the deep thudding house switched to some tacky pop ballad with soaring vocals and a swelling, orchestral instrumental. Megan’s face was centimetres away. The wispy ends of her baby hairs were tickling against Shay’s cheek. Every rational part of Shay’s brain was screaming at her to push away, but she was tipsy and uncharacteristically bold, and some part of her just said _fuck it_. She leaned in.

It was like nothing Shay had ever experienced before. Of course, she didn’t have that much to compare it with - the breadth of her kissing knowledge was limited to a few chaste pecks in eighth grade games of spin the bottle and one disastrous drunken kiss with Tyler at last year’s Halloween party - but kissing Megan set her whole body on fire. Megan’s lips, full and soft, moved rhythmically against her own and Shay could taste the sickly sweet tang of alcopops on her breath. Suddenly, Shay was acutely aware that there was too much space between them - she snaked her arm around Megan’s waist and pulled her roughly forward, pressing their bodies tightly together. Megan tangled her hands through Shay’s hair. She used just the right amount of tongue, and at the gentle scrape of teeth against Shay’s bottom lip she felt a heavy tug at the bottom of her stomach. This was better than she ever could have dreamed. _She was kissing Megan!_ There had better be fireworks going off somewhere, or some kind of parade going on in their honour because this was fucking monumental. Shay never wanted to stop, she was fully preparing to drop out of school and take up ‘kissing Megan’ as a permanent profession when all of a sudden Megan pulled abruptly away and clasped a hand to her mouth.  
“Think’m gonna be sick,” she mumbled through her fingers.

A long, low wolf whistle pierced the air. A group of meathead footballers were lingering nearby, eyeing them hungrily. Shay could almost feel their predatory gazes raking down her body like a spotlight, and it made her skin crawl.  
“Don’t stop now, ladies!” one of them guffawed. He smacked his lips together and smirked appreciatively. “We were all enjoying the show!”  
_Oh god oh god oh god._ This was the part where she should be putting these gross boys in their place with some scathing, quick-witted comeback, but her brain couldn’t even string together a single coherent sentence. Usually, Shay prided herself on having a meticulously sharp wit. She could undermine every snide comment about the tomboyish way she dressed or the fact that she only hung out with guys with sarcasm and humour, and she spent spent half her life flinging playful insults at Marlon and Tyler. But for some reason, these football dickheads with their self-righteous smirks and their greedy stares had her lost for words. She may as well have been standing naked in front of them - they’d reduced her to feeling like a vulnerable, stupid little girl. Megan seemed entirely unaffected by their leering. Maybe she was too drunk to have even noticed. She was still doubled over with her hands over her mouth, her eyes screwed up in nauseous pain. It really looked like she was going to hurl at any moment, so Shay glumly snapped herself back into action.

She dug her fingers into Megan’s upper arm, perhaps a little bit harder than necessary, and tugged her towards the nearest exit. Her face was burning, and she kept her gaze trained resolutely towards the ground. Now that Shay knew the group of footballers had seen her and Megan kiss, it felt like everyone at the party was staring at her in silent judgement. How could she have let her guard down that much? How could she have been so absolutely, monumentally stupid? Of course, _of course,_ she knew how these things worked. Her and Megan share a drunken, playful kiss in order to attract attention to themselves and some guy makes a suggestive comment, then they bat their eyelids flirtatiously and it all unfolds from there. It was the kind of thing that cool, carefree party girls did all the time. A cute but ultimately meaningless opening act to the main event. Just not for her.

The noise of the party faded into a dull, background blur as she pulled Megan outside into the warm night air. It was eerily quiet - there was a certain finality about the absence of screaming cicadas that signified summer was well and truly over. As soon as they had stumbled fully out of the door, Megan jerked forward violently and threw up into a flower bed. Perfect. Shay swept back Megan’s hair, hanging limply around her face, into one hand and used the other to pat her gingerly on the back. She was starting to feel a bit nauseous herself. Not because she was drunk - that warm, tipsy feeling had disappeared as quickly as if she had been doused in a bucket of cold water - but because she was entirely disgusted with herself. For a few glorious moments she’d actually believed that Megan had liked her back! Honestly, how dumb could she get? It was obvious that Megan’s real goal was to get attention from that group of football guys, and once again Shay was left feeling like the butt of some cruel joke. She was half expecting for someone to jump out from behind a tree at any moment and throw pig’s blood all over her. Was she just doomed to spend her whole life being strung along by straight girls, only to be viciously let down every single time? Knowing her luck, probably.  
Somewhere below Shay, Megan groaned pitifully into the flower bed.  
“How’s it going down there, Megs?” Shay tried to make her voice sound caring and sympathetic as she gave Megan’s shoulder a halfhearted squeeze, but she couldn’t find the energy to inject emotion into her bleak tone. A wave of tiredness had hit her like a club across the head and suddenly all she wanted to do was curl up in her bed and go to sleep indefinitely.  
“Mmmfghm,” was all Megan could muster as a reply, and then she hurled her guts out onto the ground again. Maybe some of it would even splash onto Shay’s shoes. She deserved it, that was for sure.

A loud snippet of pumping music and excited chatter pierced the quiet night as the door swung open and Marlon and Tyler spilled out onto the grass.  
“Shay!” Tyler exclaimed, “What the fuck, dude, we’ve been looking for you everywhere. Why didn’t you answer any of my texts?”  
“Sorry, my phone died.” Shay replied flatly. Hopefully, they’d come to tell her that they were _finally_ taking her away from this terrible party.  
“Hey Shay, guess wha- Oh Shit!” Marlon spotted Megan, splayed across the grass in a drunken state of delirium, and collapsed into peals of childish laughter. His voice sounded laborious, like he was trying to roll a heavy boulder further uphill with each word, and the earthy stink of weed rolled off his breath.  
“What the…” Shay narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “No way, is he seriously high right now?” So much for her ride home.  
“He was like that when I found him,” Tyler sighed. His eyes kept flicking down towards Megan and his lips curved in a self-satisfied grin. “But hey, I got some off this guy in there for us too. You want some, Shay?”  
He pulled a joint from his pocket and dangled it between his fingers, waving it in front of Shay’s face tantalisingly. The last thing that Shay wanted to do right now was smoke, for God’s sake. A small flicker of panic had settled in the bottom of her stomach. Marlon sure as hell couldn’t drive in his state and she had no idea how she was going to get home otherwise. She didn’t want to hang around trying to catch a lift with some asshole she barely knew. Even the thought of going back inside to face all those leering football dudes made her cheeks burn red. And what the hell was she meant to do with Megan? She couldn’t just leave her alone like this.  
“Tyler, what the fuck?” She tried to keep an even tone, but she could feel the irritation creeping into her voice. She was about to snap at any moment, she just wanted this night to end. “Not even twenty minutes ago you were highkey wanting to leave too, and now y’all want to hang around and get high together? How do you think we’re all gonna get home? Or did you not think that far ahead? Seriously, bro, I’m tired and I’m sick of this boring ass party. I just wanna go home.”  
“Dude, chill,” He held his hands up in mock surrender, and something about the smug look on his face made Shay want to scream at him. Sometimes, her friends really did piss her off. “We were just gonna catch an Uber or something. It’s no big deal.”  
“No big - Tyler, you know I don’t have the kind of cash to just drop on Ubers whenever I feel like it!”  
He dropped his gaze suddenly, looking self-conscious. Money was a touchy subject between the three of them. Marlon and Tyler always seemed to have endless amounts of the stuff and assumed that everyone else had the freedom to be as flippant about it as they were, but Shay had hardly any at all. At least they usually had the decency to act embarrassed whenever they accidentally said something insensitive, but it got tedious always having to remind them that money was an obstacle for her.  
“Well, I can shout you if you need,” he mumbled towards the ground.  
“Nevermind, that’s not even what I’m talking about!” she snapped. “I don’t wanna hang around waiting for y’all to finish getting stoned, so just fuck off. Whatever. I’ll find another way to get home.”  
“Shay…” Tyler began apologetically, but he trailed off into an awkward silence. She’d already pointedly turned her attention back to Megan, anyway. She knew she had been too harsh on Tyler. It wasn’t his fault her night had gone to shit, after all, but he could really be a selfish jerk sometimes.

Before either of them had a chance to break the pointed silence, the door swung open again and Grace hurried out with one of her friends in tow. The intimidating one, who always wore the heavy eyeliner and all the black clothes. What was her name again? Shay was sure Megan had mentioned her a few times, but she couldn’t remember.  
“I thought I told you that I’d be back to get her!” Grace said irritably in lieu of a greeting. “Why did you run off? We’ve been looking for you for ages!”  
Shay thought that this was a bit unfair. What was she meant to do, just let Megan puke her guts up all over the floor inside while they were waiting for Grace to get back from whatever mysterious, urgent task she had to do?  
"She’s so sick,” Grace continued, dropping to her knees beside Megan and clutching her shoulders in concern. “Zoya, do you still have that bottle of water in your bag?”  
_So that’s her name,_ Shay thought numbly as she watched Zoya fish a big water bottle out of her bag and hand it silently to Grace. In the few seconds she’d been distracted, Tyler and Marlon had already slipped away back inside. Shay tried to convince herself that she didn’t care about how quickly and unashamedly they’d ditched her. Whatever. Fuck them.  
“What do you think we should do with her? Do you think she needs to go to the hospital, or something?” Zoya asked tentatively. Grace looked lost, and it took Shay a few moments to realise that she was expected to weigh in on their decision. She was so tired, she was struggling to keep track of their conversation.  
“The hospital? Nah - she’ll be fine.” It was kind of surprising to see the looks of concern on their faces. Taking care of drunk people was second nature to Shay, she’d forgotten that not everyone was as blasé about it as she was. “I reckon she just needs to go home and sleep it off.”  
“Are you sure?” Grace tried to coax Megan into taking a few sips of water, but all she did was mumble incomprehensibly and palm the bottle away with a heavy, sloppy jerk of her arm.  
“Yeah.” _I’ve seen way worse,_ Shay wanted to add reassuringly, but she didn’t want to prompt any questions that would lead to further conversation with these girls. She barely knew them, and even around her friends Shay was carefully taciturn about her personal life.  
“I can drive her home,” Zoya offered immediately. “I’ll come back after, so you, Kelsey and Jo can stay here.”  
“She can’t go home like this!” said Grace. “I’ll take her back to my place instead, can you drop us there, Zoya?”  
At least that got Megan out of her hair. Now that the responsibility of babysitting a drunk, sloppy Megan had been taken off her shoulders, Shay’s lingering concern for how she was going to get home was growing into a full-blown panic. As Grace and Zoya each slung an arm around Megan and heaved her up into a standing position, Shay mentally ran through a list of the rest of her acquaintances at the party. She didn’t know any of them well enough to ask for a lift home. The only option was to wait for Marlon and Tyler and then hopefully guilt one of them into paying for her Uber. It wasn’t a very inviting prospect. How did she always end up getting into such messy situations?  
“And what about you, girl?” Zoya turned around suddenly and addressed Shay.  
“Huh?” Shay had no idea what Zoya was talking about. Her train of thought had been interrupted abruptly, and she wondered if she’d missed an important part of the conversation.  
“How are you getting home?” Zoya pressed. “I can give you a lift too if you need, it’s no trouble.”  
It was the kind of wild, crazy luck that Shay almost never experienced. She felt a huge knot of stress unclench in her stomach and she was so overwhelmed with relief she almost wanted to cry. It was kind of pathetic, really, but she hadn’t fully realised just how much she needed to get away from the party until she actually had a chance to leave.  
"That would be great, thank you,” she replied quietly, and she meant every word of it.

As soon as all of the car doors slammed shut, Zoya hit a button on her steering wheel decisively and a slow R&B song with a smooth, relaxing beat pumped through the speakers. It was clear that she wanted to spend the drive in silence, and Shay wouldn’t have had it any other way. Trying to make stilted small talk for the whole ride home sounded like a nightmare. She let the music wash over her in calming waves, the rhythmic thud of the bass pounding in her chest as she watched the road ahead speed towards them out of the inky black night. She was finally alone with her thoughts.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the first chatpter of a WIP! I have a few more chapters pre-written, so I'll probably post the next chapter in a few days :)
> 
> Feel free to go check out my tumblr! [@shaygans](http://shaygans.tumblr.com)


	2. Chapter 2

Shay woke up on Sunday morning feeling like she’d been whacked around the head with a baseball bat. There was a nauseous, churning sensation in the pit of her stomach and her mouth was uncomfortably dry. It was so bright. Ugh. Why was it so bright? Sunlight seared painfully against her eyes as she slowly pried apart her heavy lids, and out her bedroom window she could see a brilliant, blue expanse of sky. Vaguely, Shay wondered what time it was. It felt like she’d only fallen asleep minutes ago, but outside it looked like it was well past midday. A disembodied voice was chattering cheerfully somewhere nearby, causing the headache wracking Shay’s brain to pound irritatingly. It was unbearably loud. Who the hell made that much noise on a Sunday morning? Slowly, she propped herself up against her pillows and looked around groggily for the source of the noise.

Sure enough, she spotted the culprit immediately. With her characteristic lack of regard for personal boundaries, Jacs was face down in Shay’s wardrobe rummaging carelessly through her clothes and chatting brightly into the phone, not bothering to keep her voice down. All Shay wanted to do was slide back into her bed and go to sleep again, but it wasn’t exactly like she could tell Jacs to get out - this was her house after all.  
“What are you doing in here?” Shay mumbled thickly. As she spoke, Jacs whipped her head around to face her, beaming.  
“You’re awake!” she exclaimed, flinging both arms out theatrically. Jacs did everything theatrically, she was a never ending one-woman show. “Finally! I was starting to think you’d _died_ , or something.” She held the phone out towards Shay at arm’s length. “I was just talking to mom, you want to say hi?”  
“Hi, Aunt Frankie.” Shay called out, her voice muffled as she flopped face down into the pile of pillows on her bed. She loved her cousin’s electrifying, dramatic energy, but it could be a lot to deal with the first thing after waking up - especially when she was hungover and her head felt like it was about to be cleaved in two. Luckily, she had a few minutes to try and pull herself together. Jacs had snapped her attention back to the phone and was continuing her conversation jovially, waving her arms about in emotive gesticulation.

Living with Jacs had been a sharp learning curve for Shay. She’d been brought up accustomed to loneliness - dark, dingy houses devoid of soul with drawn curtains and floorboards that creaked. It was the antithesis in every way to Jacs’ friendly, little apartment. There was always something going on here. Usually, when Shay got home from school she was greeted by visits from family or someone from Jacs’ wide circle of friends, and even when it was just the two of them the house was never really quiet. The residual silence was always disrupted by the low mumble of the television, or the clattering sounds of Jacs messing around in the kitchen, or even the upstairs neighbours playing their stereo too loudly. It felt _homey_. Shay welcomed the warm atmosphere of the apartment, so wildly different to what she was used to, but it did take some time to get accustomed to. Sometimes all the attention and activity could be a little bit overwhelming.

She’d moved in with Jacs just after the start of summer break, when she’d suddenly snapped in the middle of an argument with her mother and stormed out of the house impulsively with a hastily packed duffel bag slung over her shoulder, slamming the door behind her. Initially she’d crashed on Marlon’s couch, just like she’d been doing for years, but after about two weeks his parents started giving her the side-eye and she knew she’d overstayed her welcome. Luckily, her cousin was a student at the University of Austin and lived nearby, and her flatmate had just left on exchange for a year so she had a free room in her apartment. So Shay and Jacs became housemates. It was a perfect arrangement. Child support from her dad who lived out of state covered the rent and bills, and Shay earned enough to pay for food and everything else by stacking shelves a few times a week at the grocery store down the road. After the dust had settled, she even still lived close enough to her mother to visit every so often and check up on her. She was also only a few blocks away from Megan’s house, but Shay tried as hard as she could not to think about that.

The background drone of chatter had faded to a conspicuous silence as Jacs hung up the phone, and Shay looked up from her nest of pillows to see Jacs rifling through all her clothes with renewed vigour.  
“Camo, camo, camo…” she sighed exaggeratedly, flinging her bouncy curls through the air as she swept around to face Shay. “Do you own anything that’s not fucking camouflage print, Sooks?”  
Jacs was a firm believer in the power of nicknames. It was something like her personal mission to find one for everyone that she met, and she absolutely hated it when anyone called her by her full name, Jacqueline. In exceptionally formal circumstances she went by Jacquie, but otherwise she was Jacs to everyone. She was the only one who still referred to Shay as ‘Sooks’, an old pet name that her family members had called her when she was a child. Shay pretended to give an exasperated sigh everytime Jacs used her nickname, but secretly she loved it. Every time she heard it, it felt like a warm, reassuring squeeze around the shoulder. Her full name was only four letters, so most people weren’t bothered to shorten it any further. The only person other than Jacs who had a nickname for her was Megan.  
“What are you doing with all my clothes, anyway?” Shay groaned.  
“I’m going to this party at Gen’s place tonight, and this girl I’m into is gonna be there so I kinda wanted to butch it up a bit,” Jacs replied matter-of-factly as she held up another one of Shay’s shirts, looking at it apprehensively for a few seconds before shaking her head and tossing it carelessly to the side. “I thought I might be able to borrow some of your stuff. You dress more like a lesbian than me, and that’s saying something.”  
_Fuck fuck fuck._ A wave of nausea crashed into Shay as memories from last night came flooding back to her. How many people had seen her kiss Megan? Surely they’d spread it around after she’d left the party. Had Jacs somehow heard about it? It was possible, Jacs knew almost everyone. How many people now knew that Shay was a… a… She couldn’t even bring herself to say the word in her head, let alone out loud. Realistically, she knew she was probably panicking for no reason. Jacs made jokes like that all the time, there was no way she was being serious! She couldn’t have found out what happened… right? This rational vein of thinking did nothing to ease the screeching alarm sirens going off inside Shay’s head.

Jacs either hadn’t seen the dumbstruck look of terror flit across Shay’s face, or she was pretending not to notice. Maybe she thought it was just a side effect of being hungover. Whatever she concluded, Jacs continued on like nothing had happened.  
“I don’t think any of your stuff would fit me anyway,” she held up a pair of cargo pants to herself and scrutinised her reflection in the mirror. They were ridiculously short for her, only reaching to her mid calf. “Ugh. Why are you so short, Sooks?”  
“Maybe you should just use your own clothes then!” Shay quipped, lobbing a pillow at Jacs. She tried to make her tone sound playful and lighthearted, but she could still hear a slight shakiness in her voice.  
“Fine, fine,” Jacs sighed dramatically and dumped all of Shay’s clothes unceremoniously back into their drawers. “So,” she rounded on Shay abruptly, a cheeky smirk spreading across her face. “Looks like someone had a big night out, hey?”  
“Fuck off,” Shay replied weakly, hiding her face among the pillows. A pang of fear struck painfully at her chest but she quashed it. _Jacs is just messing around. She’s not serious._ The thought circled desperately around her head like a reassuring mantra.  
Jacs cackled and threw herself onto the bed, nudging Shay enthusiastically. “How much did you drink last night? Did you do anything wild?” She spoke with the gleeful fervour of an over-excited child ripping open presents on Christmas morning. “You have to tell me everything that happened!”  
A vivid picture flitted across Shay’s mind. The taste of Megan’s lips moving roughly against her own, the feel of her hands tangling hungrily into her hair. She could hear a soft moan catch in Megan’s throat as clearly as if she were lying right next to her. Shit. Shay’s whole body stiffened as she felt shame burning hotly in her cheeks. Don’t think about that.  
Jacs must have noticed her sudden shift in mood. “Hey, is everything okay?” she muttered, her tone softening tactfully as she gently brushed a strand of hair away from Shay’s face. “You seem upset.”  
“I’m fine,” Shay replied. It was her natural response to everything. She wasn’t the kind of person that divulged her problems in the first place, and telling Jacs about her kiss with Megan would open a whole new can of worms that Shay did not think she was ready to confront yet. “I just feel sick, okay.”  
“Are you sure?” Jacs didn’t sound entirely convinced. She had a keen intuition and an unending skill for reading social situations, and she could almost always tell when Shay was upset. “You’re not acting like yourself today.”  
“Jacs, seriously,” In a swift motion Shay rolled over and locked eyes with her cousin, assembling her face into what she hoped was a reassuring expression. “I’m just hungover. That’s all. I’ll be back to normal in a few hours.”  
“Okay then, I guess I’ll leave you alone to rest,” Jacs conceded, giving Shay’s shoulder a quick, supportive squeeze before climbing out of the bed. As she was about to leave the room, she swung back around off the door frame to address Shay again. “I’ll leave some coffee in the kitchen for you, hey? And you should get up and have a shower. It’ll make you feel slightly less dead, trust me.”  
“Thanks, Jacs.” Shay mumbled as the door slid shut on its hinges.

In the silence of her newly empty bedroom, an overwhelming feeling of emptiness began to gnaw at Shay’s insides as she stared numbly at the ceiling. She didn’t know why it was so hard for her to just tell Jacs. It was one hundred percent risk free - Jacs would be thrilled when she found out. Just three little words: _I like girls._ But whenever Shay even thought about saying it out loud, her chest tightened fearfully and she felt her throat close up. She had only ever come out to one person. It was a few weeks before the end of sophomore year, just as the dry laziness of summer had crept into the air, bringing with it a sense of carelessness and freedom. After band practice, Marlon had rushed off home and Shay and Tyler had splayed themselves out across the dry grass of Tyler’s backyard, sipping on cold beer and gazing up at the endless expanse of star studded blackness overhead. There was something about the slow summer night, thick with the raucous chirping of cicadas, that made Shay feel untouchable. The warm buzz of alcohol tingled underneath her skin as she made up her mind recklessly.  
“I have something to tell you,” she had blurted out abruptly, shattering the easy, companionable calm hanging between them.  
“What is it?” Tyler replied quietly.  
The silence had stretched, anticipatory and oppressive as Shay’s chest heaved in a heavy sigh. Her heart thudded anxiously, but she felt like it was now or never. “I… I like Megan. As more than a friend.” Her voice cracked as the words flung out into the night air. It felt like the earth was shattering around her.  
A few long, tense moments ticked by before Tyler responded, and Shay sensed some kind of momentous incorporeal change pass between them. “Okay,” was all he had said. Both of them kept their stares fixed stiffly skywards.  
“What do you think about that?” she pressed gently. She was paralysed with fear as a string of possible outcomes raced through her head. She could hear her own voice distantly, like it belonged to someone else.  
“I’m not surprised,” he mused slowly. “Lowkey, I kinda expected it.”  
“Do you hate me?” It was the question she had been dying to ask.  
“No!” Tyler responded immediately in firm assurance. “Shay, I would never… I don’t see you any differently than before. For real.”  
“Okay.” Part of her was beyond relieved that Tyler was being so unquestionably accepting, but another part of her kind of wanted to shake him. This was her big moment! She deserved an equally significant reaction. Maybe a cheer, or a round of applause, or a gasp of disbelief. She wished Tyler would at least _look_ at her. The whole thing had turned out to be very anticlimactic.  
“I’m gay too,” he suddenly admitted, his voice barely more than a whisper. “I guess I should tell you, since you told me.”  
“Oh! I’m not… I’m not, y’know…” As hard as she tried, it was like her mouth didn’t know how to shape the word. “I don’t wanna put a label on myself, like, I can still like Megan and not be… yeah. But that’s great, Tyler. I guess, uhh… Thanks for telling me.”  
Neither of them had really talked about it after that night. Apart from a few late night facetime sessions, when the overwhelming loneliness of concealing her biggest secret became too suffocating for Shay to shoulder on her own, they had some sort of unspoken pact not to mention it to each other. The less Shay talked about her feelings for Megan, the easier it was for her to pretend they simply didn’t exist. But if gossip started circulating about her actions at the party… Shay didn’t even want to think about what would happen after that. She was nowhere near ready for anyone else to know, let alone the whole school. Her whole body gave an involuntary shudder at the idea.

As much as she wanted to burrow back into her bed and hide away for the rest of eternity, Shay knew that she’d have to confront the fallout from last night eventually. Rolling over laboriously, she fumbled under her bed for her phone and unplugged it from it’s charger cord. Nine new texts and five missed calls were waiting for her, as well as a few unopened snapchats. Eight of the nine texts were from Tyler:  
_9:08pm: sup i found marlon, where are u??  
__9:14pm: hellooo??? can’t find u anywhere  
__9:16pm: SHAY  
__9:17pm: REPLY TO ME YOU FUCKIGN DIPSHIT  
__11:50pm: ok we leaving fr now bruh u still here? i’ll shout your uber all goood  
__11:51pm: ksdsdfjkk SORRY forgot your phone died im fried af well i can’t see u anywhere so?? lmk if u got home i guess  
__12:22am: hello still dk if ur home are you alive????  
__9:34am: ok well at least jacs answers her fucking phone maybe text me next time so ik ur not DEAD bro,,,, ffs  
_ Tyler had also left her three missed calls. Part of her felt a pang of guilt for leaving him hanging all night, but she still hadn’t completely forgiven him for ditching her. Serves him right for being an asshole. The last text was from Marlon:  
        _10:45am: Hey dude sorry for ditching you last night it was a dick move :/ hope you got home OK though._  
At least Marlon had apologised, even if it was kind of a lame ass effort. Nevertheless, Shay felt herself exhale a suspenseful breath she hadn’t even realised she was holding. If neither Marlon or Tyler had mentioned the kiss, she was certain they hadn’t heard about it. Maybe no one who saw it had cared enough to spread it around after all. The last two missed calls were from her mother - one at 2:23am and one at 3:04am, but that wasn’t anything out of the ordinary. Her mom made a habit of calling her randomly at all hours of the day, and Shay made a habit of never picking up. God knows what her mother had wanted to talk about this time. At least she hadn’t left any crazy voicemails, like she sometimes did.

Now that Shay was reassured the whole school wasn’t talking about her, she suddenly felt a lot better. The slightly seedy, hungover feeling dissipated almost completely and the sky outside seemed to gleam slightly brighter. Suddenly, she wasn’t in the mood to mope around in her room all day anymore. As she moved to slide out of bed and get in the shower, her phone buzzed with another new text. This one was from Megan.  
_Thanks for taking care of me last night girl, sorry I was such a mess. I really appreciate it <3 You’re an angel xx  
_Shay read through the text several times before flopping back down onto her bed wistfully. When she closed her eyes, she could see Megan’s words swimming through her mind like they were burned onto the back of her eyelids. You’re an angel xx. Something fluttery and embarrassing flickered in her chest, and she couldn’t help but break into a smile. Right now, on the other end of the phone, Megan was staring at the exact same display that she was. Shay glanced longingly at the little icon on the screen showing that she was currently online. What was she thinking right now? She hadn’t mentioned the kiss at all. Maybe she didn’t even remember it. Shay tried to draft a response, but she only managed to type a few words before she violently hit the delete button. Type. Delete. Type. Delete. It was no use. She couldn’t think of anything to say to Megan that would adequately express how she was feeling right now. Chucking her phone to the side, she slunk into the bathroom to take a shower with the text still echoing in her ears.

Hours later, when Shay was settling into her corner of the couch to watch some late night Netflix with Jacs, her mind was still buzzing with Megan’s words. She had read the text countless times, deconstructing each individual letter until the message was permanently etched on her brain, but it had done nothing to ease her churning, tumultuous thoughts. Dark, disjointed images of the kiss plagued her mind - a flash of heat as Megan’s tongue ran slickly across her lips, a shudder as the feel of Megan’s soft skin passed beneath her hands. The places where Megan had touched her burned retroactively, memories prickling softly as they were imprinted on her body forever. Maybe it meant nothing to Megan, but Shay knew she’d never be able to stop thinking about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who left kudos or comments on the last chapter! They all made me so happy <3
> 
> Hit me up on tumblr [@shaygans](http://shaygans.tumblr.com) if you feel like it


	3. Chapter 3

Monday was typically the worst day of the week, but today it was especially torturous. As much as Shay tried to avoid Megan, she just seemed to keep turning up in the periphery of everything. Right now it was lunch period, and across the quad Shay could see her standing idly with her friends, ponytail bobbing behind her head as she chatted animatedly. There was something so transfixing about her that Shay couldn’t help but stare. She watched as Megan threw her head back in uproarious laughter, along with all her friends. What kind of joke had they all found so funny? It was obvious that Megan had completely forgotten about the kiss.  _ How nice for her,  _ Shay thought bitterly. It was nothing more than a tiny blip on Megan’s radar, whereas the memory was still eating away savagely at Shay’s insides.  
“Shay! Shay!” Vaguely, she heard Tyler trying to get her attention, but she was too lost in her own thoughts to care about anything he had to say. No doubt it was something supremely uninteresting, anyway. “Oi, dipshit!” Tyler flung a scrunched up ball of paper at her, hitting her on the side of the head.  
“Ouch, fuck!” she exclaimed irritatedly, snapping out of her vacant train of thought to glare at Tyler. “What do you want?”  
“Yo, can you help me with question three? I don’t know how to do it.”  
“I don’t even take algebra anymore, Tyler.” Shay sighed. “Why don’t you get Marlon to help you? Aren’t y’all like, literally in the same class?”   
“Yeah but didn’t you get, like, an A in this subject last year, bruh? The only reason you’re not in class with us is because you’re in pre-calc now with all the other nerds.” Tyler slung an arm around Marlon’s shoulders. “Anyway, I don’t want help from this bitch boy, we all know he sucks at math.”  
“I don’t suck at math!” Marlon retorted, shoving Tyler’s shoulder playfully. “At least I don’t cheat on all my tests, like Shay does.” he added slyly, his narrowed eyes sliding to face her.  
“Uhh, you’re a liar,” she jibed in response, getting into the swing of the banter. “‘Cause I never even cheated once, bro! You’re just jealous, ‘cause I’m hella smart at math and you’re not.”  
“Yeah right, whatever,” Marlon snorted, rolling his eyes. Shay didn’t know why he loved to joke about her cheating all the time, because she’d really never actually done it. Well,  _ once _ she’d freaked out before a history quiz and scribbled a few dates on a sheet of paper that she’d slipped into the exam, but she was so scared of getting caught that she never actually looked at them during the test. That hardly made her a serial cheater. Maybe Marlon just couldn’t deal with the fact that she got better marks than him.

Suddenly, Marlon jumped out of his seat like he’d just sat on top of something sharp and slicked back his hair self-consciously, nibbling on his lower lip. “Oh shit!” he muttered. “That’s Ayesha over there! Do I look okay, guys?”  
The girl in question had just sauntered into the quad, flanked by a posse of her giggling, kitten jacket clad friends. She was extremely pretty, Shay had to admit, and way out of Marlon’s league. Shay could understand why he was so nervous to see her. With her long, glossy black hair and bright, dimpled smile Ayesha was one of those girls that was so ethereally gorgeous that she seemed to emit a slightly hypnotising glow as she walked. Quite a few people jerked their heads in a double take as she sauntered past them. It was very distracting. Shay suddenly realised she was staring, and snapped her gaze away shamefully.   
“What the fuck is with you, bro?” Tyler goaded, nudging Marlon with his elbow. “What, did things not go down well between y’all on Saturday night?”  
“No!” Marlon rebutted, shoving Tyler in return. “Actually, things went great. Shut up!” he snapped anticipatedly at Shay and Tyler, who caught each other’s eyes furtively. “I’m gonna go and ask her out.”  
“Whaaat?” Shay leered cheekily, at the same time that Tyler snickered and said: “That’s a big ass flex, bruh.”  
“Fuck off,” he countered, as they jeered at him. They were both such  _ supportive _ friends. Marlon ignored their incessant teasing and took a deep breath as his eyes steeled determinedly. “Well, I guess I’m gonna go do it.”   
“What? Right now?” Shay asked, dumbstruck. Tyler stopped laughing abruptly. If he was really planning to ask her out right here in front of everyone, Marlon was ballsier than she thought.  
“No better time than the present! Later for y’all.” He grinned roguishly and winked at them both before striding briskly across the quad towards Ayesha and her friends. Shay had never seen him walk with such purpose. This girl really did have him whipped.  _ Good for him,  _ Shay supposed, but she couldn’t help but feel a bitter twist of resentment quelling in her stomach. She’d give anything to have even a fraction of the confidence that he did. How was it so easy for Marlon to publicly declare his feelings for Ayesha when Shay couldn’t even make eye contact with Megan without feeling ashamed and embarrassed? It was wildly unfair.

Across the quad, Marlon had managed to separate Ayesha from her group of gaggling followers and was speaking softly to her, lightly swinging their interlocked fingers to and fro. Whatever sentimental garbage he was spouting at her, it looked like Ayesha was lapping it up. A short distance away, Shay could also see that Megan was glaring at Marlon stroppily, her mouth set into a firm, disapproving line. Despite her best efforts to suppress it, Shay felt a pang in her chest. No matter how much Megan talked about being completely over Marlon, it was obvious that there was still some sort of unresolved drama between them. Kissing Shay had been nothing more than a strategy for her. Unfortunately, this bleak mindset did nothing to abate the turbulent memories of the kiss circling around Shay’s mind. Conversely, the more that Shay tried to forget about Saturday night, the heavier it plagued upon her consciousness. And she hadn’t shared what happened with anyone. She’d been keeping too much to herself. Her head was so full of thoughts she felt like it was about to burst at the seams.  
“I gotta tell you something,” she burst out, whipping around to face Tyler.  
“What is it?” Tyler said distractedly. He was still craning his neck to peer discreetly in Marlon’s direction, looking annoyed. “Don’t tell me _you_ hooked up with someone at that dumbass football party _too._ Maybe that’s why I couldn’t find you all night.”  
He chuckled and grinned at her expectantly. It was obviously meant to be a joke, but Shay didn’t laugh. A pointed silence hung in the air as she nibbled her lip shyly and stared down at her hands.  
“No way… No fucking way! Seriously, Shay, are you messing with me? You had your first real kiss and you didn’t tell me ‘til now?” Tyler exploded. He looked so incredulous, you’d have thought Shay had just slapped him. “Holy shit, dude, who was it?” He lowered his voice to a whisper, looking furtively around to make sure they weren’t being overheard. “Was it a girl? Fuck, was it someone we know? I’m freaking out here, bruh, you gotta tell me who it was.”  
“Uhh,” Shay raked a hand anxiously through her hair. She knew that Tyler would totally freak out when she told him. He was practically salivating in anticipation already. “Please don’t lose your shit but… I made out with Megan.”  
Just as she expected, Tyler bugged out so much that it looked like his eyes were about to pop out of his head. “Nah… Nah… No way!” he kept repeating. He seemed totally lost for words. “You must’ve been tripping the fuck out, Shay. Are you sure that actually happened?”  
“Yeah, it did happen!” she snapped in annoyance. Did Tyler really think she would make something like that up? “And she kissed me, not the other way around. She was mad wasted though,” Shay sighed heavily. “I don’t think she even remembers it at all.”  
“Holy shit, Shay,” Tyler’s mouth was still hanging open in disbelief. “I can’t believe you really did that. You actually went out and kissed your crush. Do you even know how iconic that is? You’re, like, my queen.”  
He clasped his hands together facetiously and mimed bowing down to her in worship. Shay was already regretting telling him anything. Getting it off her chest was meant to make her feel better, but Tyler’s over dramatic reaction was the last way she wanted her news to be received. As much as she knew that he was just trying to cheer her up, all he was succeeding in doing was making her feel slightly queasy.  
“Yeah, well it doesn’t really feel iconic,” Shay grumbled acidly, and Tyler’s gleeful expression evaporated. Crap, she hadn’t meant to sound so bitter. “I know I should be really happy and everything, but I just feel kinda shitty, to be honest.”  
“What? Why?” Tyler asked.  
There were so many ways she wanted to answer that question. But how could she even begin to explain the conflicting myriad of emotion that had been building inside of her ever since she kissed Megan? Tyler would never understand all the embarrassment and shame and _confusion_ that she felt. She could only imagine the look on his face if she tried to point it all out to him. So instead of delving into her real concerns, she just said: “I just… I don’t think it was serious for her. Like, she was just doing it for fun, or attention, or whatever. Besides, she’s straight, remember? She hasn’t even tried to talk to me about it yet, so…”  
“Okay, dude, so maybe she was just messing around because she was hammered,” Tyler started encouragingly. “But maybe she hasn’t talked to you about it yet because she likes you too and she’s shy. Did you consider that, genius?”   
“You’re crazy,” Shay muttered weakly, and she fought to suppress the flutter of hope in her chest. She knew Tyler was ever the blind optimist, but she wanted to believe him so badly. It was just too unrealistic. Megan was straight as hell, and even if she wasn’t… Shay quashed her train of thought quickly. It was purely hypothetical, and it would only end up making her upset. _She was straight._ Shay needed to hammer that fact into her brain.  
“Y’all should at least talk about it,” Tyler pressed on. “Otherwise you’ll never know. You gotta promise me you’ll talk to her, at least.”  
Shay looked away non-committedly, laughing feebly to herself.  
“Come on, Shay, promise me!” he stressed, grabbing her forearm and shaking it doggedly. “Don’t be a pussy, bro.”  
“Fine!” she snatched her arm out of his grip. “I’ll talk to her,” she conceded grudgingly, which Tyler seemed to deem acceptable. But as he idly changed the topic and nattered away to her about some shit to do with music (she wasn’t really paying attention), Shay thought privately that she would never willingly initiate a conversation with Megan about what happened between them. If Shay just kept ignoring her, eventually her feelings would just whittle away to nothing. That was how these things worked, right? Maybe she’d even forget the kiss ever happened. It would certainly be a whole lot easier.

***

If Shay thought the rest of the week was going to be an improvement from Monday, she was decidedly incorrect. Her strategy of ignoring Megan was not going as successfully as she had hoped it would. In a school of over a thousand students, you’d have thought it would be quite manageable to avoid one person, but this logic didn’t seem to extend to Shay’s circumstances. Wherever she went, Megan just seemed to follow. Shay felt like she was being pursued by a particularly strong and stubborn magnet. She was beginning to lose her nerve. On Tuesday lunch, Megan had waved at her casually from across the cafeteria; which made Shay nearly drop the tray of food she was holding in shock before scurrying off to the table where Marlon and Tyler were sitting, without even waving back. This kind of shyness was far too off brand for her. She was starting to feel as hopelessly whipped as Marlon looked nowadays, practically skipping whenever he caught sight of his new girlfriend. It was beginning to get very embarrassing. So by the time Wednesday afternoon rolled around, she was looking forward to her pre-calc double period so much that she turned up early. As she slid into her regular seat - second row from the back, at the desk up against the wall - she breathed a sigh of relief. She’d never admit this out loud to anyone because it sounded so pathetically nerdy, but math was by far her favourite subject. Math was something that Shay unquestionably excelled at. She loved how straightforward and structured it was; as long as you understood the logic and the formula it was easy to find the solution, and there was only ever one correct answer. It was a welcome reprieve from all the chaos surrounding the rest of her complicated life.

She shifted sideways in her chair, leaning casually against the brick wall of the room and chewing a piece of gum nonchalantly as she watched the rest of her class trickle in one by one. Around half the class had settled into their seats before, to Shay’s immense surprise, she spotted a familiar face stroll purposefully into the classroom. It was the girl who had driven her home on Saturday night! Megan’s friend, Zoya. Shay narrowed her eyes in thought. While it was true she wouldn’t be able to recognise the faces of half the people from her pre-calc class, she was sure she hadn’t seen Zoya in any of their few previous lessons since the start of the year. Had she been there the whole time, without Shay even noticing? Maybe she really just hadn’t been paying attention. Zoya hovered for a few seconds in the doorway, examining the classroom tentatively before locking eyes with Shay and making a beeline towards her, settling in the seat beside her.  
“Hi,” she said briskly, unpacking her things and setting them neatly at the front of her desk. “You’re that girl I drove home on the weekend, right? Meg’s friend?”  
“Uhh,” Shay stammered. She didn’t know exactly how to describe her relationship with Megan, but ‘friend’ certainly wasn’t the first word that came to mind. Something like ‘person who she flirts with periodically when she feels insecure’ would probably be more appropriate. Or maybe ‘hopelessly pathetic admirer from afar’. “Yeah, that’s me, I guess,” she conceded. Best to keep it simple, for arguments sake.  
Zoya stared at her quizzically for a few seconds. “Okay,” she finally reconciled. “I’m not taking anyone’s seat here?”   
“Nah, go ahead.”  
“Great.” She flashed Shay a quick grin before flicking open her exercise book and printing the date neatly at the top corner of the page. Zoya certainly didn’t waste her words. Everything she said had a clear and concise purpose in directing the conversation. It made Shay feel slightly off-kilter.   
“Sorry if this sounds kinda dumb,” Shay started unsurely. “But have you always been in this class? I never noticed you before.”  
“This is my first lesson,” explained Zoya, as the bell for afternoon period rang out in the hallway. “They moved me and a couple of other kids up into the top class after the first quiz. See?” She pointed discreetly across the room. “That guy’s also new, and so is that girl over there. You need to pay more attention, girl!” There was a chiding lilt in her voice as she smiled lopsidedly at Shay.  
“Oh, right,” Shay let out a chuckle in return. “Sorry. I didn’t notice.”  

Just then, the teacher walked into class and Zoya turned her attention dutifully to the front. Apart from a few hasty questions about the work, they didn’t have much time to chat after that. Pre-calc always set mountains of coursework, and Shay spent most of the class staring so intently at her exercise book that the tip of her nose was nearly rubbing against the paper. She finally looked up once the double period was almost over to see Zoya swiftly packing away all her materials into her bag a few minutes early. By the time the bell rang for the end of school she was already rising out of her chair.  
“Well, I’ve got places to be,” she stated matter-of-factly, swinging her bag onto her back. “I’ll see you in class tomorrow.”  
“Okay, bye!” Shay called out, but she only saw the flick of Zoya’s black coat as she strode briskly out of the classroom. Shay couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but there was something she really liked about Zoya. She had a great taste in music. She was confident. And her fashion sense was on point. She seemed like the kind of person who didn’t tolerate any shit. Shay admired people like that. Actually, it seemed like the two of them had a lot in common. In her head, Shay resolved that she definitely wanted to become friends with Zoya.

Shay dawdled as she was packing up her supplies. The school bus didn’t arrive for another fifteen minutes and she hated waiting around at the bus stop, surrounded by squealing, prepubescent freshmen as she watched everyone else in her grade drive past in their cars and judge her. It wasn’t her fault she had to catch the bus home! She had a learner’s permit and everything, but she didn’t know any responsible adults who could teach her how to drive. It wasn’t for lack of trying, either. Jacs was desperate to take Shay out for lessons in her little second-hand Mazda, but nineteen year olds weren’t allowed to teach learners, and neither of them had any other family in Austin who could take over the role. Well, there was her mother, but Shay resolved that she would rather stay a learner forever than resort to that. The idea of her mother sitting down in the passenger seat of the car and giving Shay a proper driving lesson was almost comical. So, for the foreseeable future she was stuck catching the school bus.

The late afternoon sun flared low and bright on the horizon and Shay squinted as she trudged slowly out of the school gates towards the bus stop. Maybe Marlon would cave today and give her a lift home, even though it was completely out of his way. She pulled out her phone to call him, but as her finger hovered over his contact she was distracted by an obscure figure moving towards her across the grass. The glare of the sun shrouded the silhouette in shadow and Shay couldn’t make out their identity, but whoever it was waved at her enthusiastically. It wasn’t until they were only a few feet away that their face finally came into focus. For God’s sake. It was Megan.  
“Hi, Shay!” she said brightly.  
“Oh, hey Megs.” Shay tried to sound casual and relaxed, but all she could hear inside her head was an endlessly repeated noise similar to the sound of a computer error. She thought it might be rude to blurt out the question that she really wanted to ask, which was ‘What do you want from me?’, so she tactfully waited in silence for Megan to speak again.  
“So I was wondering…” Megan started, looking up at Shay with a coy smile that made her heart melt just a little bit, despite herself. “What are you doing this afternoon?”  
“Well, I was just gonna go home and like, chill, you know,” Shay answered, rocking back and forth on her toes uncomfortably. She hadn’t had a proper, sober conversation with Megan since before the summer, and she wasn’t entirely sure how to act around her anymore. “Maybe watch some Netflix, or something. I don’t know. Why?”  
“Well, since you’re not doing anything, I thought maybe we could hang out. I’ll buy you a smoothie.”   
Shay felt a stab of internal panic. Why did Megan suddenly want to hang out with her, out of the blue? It could only be related to what happened on Saturday, right? Shay didn’t think she was ready to talk about all of that yet. _Just say no, just say you’re busy, just say no,_ her subconscious chanted. “Alright, sounds good,” she heard herself reply instead. Damn it. She couldn’t say no when Megan was looking at her like that.   
“Great!” Megan’s smile didn’t entirely reach her eyes. She looked slightly nervous too, which gave Shay a slim hint of comfort. “I’ll drive us, then.”  
They spent most of the fifteen-minute drive in tentative silence. Shay opened her mouth on the brink of speaking a couple of times, but then shut it abruptly. None of the conversation topics that she could think of seemed entirely appropriate anymore. After everything that had happened between them, it just felt kind of stupid to try and make inane small talk. Megan was blasting music enthusiastically through the AUX cord to try and fill the gaping quiet between them, tapping her fingers against the steering wheel and humming as she drove. Occasionally she’d make comments like ‘Ugh, I really love this part!’ or ‘Listen to the lyrics here, they’re so good’ and Shay would agree non-committedly, even though she hated this kind of music. It was all slow, melancholy indie music with lots of acoustic guitars and wailing, soulful lyrics. Depression music, Shay liked to call it. It was all Megan listened to. Shay wondered what that said about her current state of mind.

Shay had never actually ordered a smoothie for herself before, and she hadn’t realised how many flavour choices there would be on the menu. In the end it was all too overwhelming, so she just ordered the same thing as Megan. It was something with berries and pineapple and - well, Shay hadn’t really been paying attention, but it tasted good enough. As good as smoothies got, at least. To be perfectly honest, she didn’t even like smoothies that much, but Megan was pretty fanatical about them so she pretended. When she watched how excited Megan got about her overpriced cup of blended-up fruit, she could almost convince herself that she loved them too. They carried their drinks outside and sat down at a little table tucked into the corner of the outdoor seating area.  
“So…” Megan took a long slurp from her straw as she trailed off helplessly. An awkward, tentative silence dragged between them. “I keep wondering why they always give out plastic straws here,” she started up again, rambling desperately. An uncomfortable smile was pasted on her face and she giggled nervously before continuing. “You know, because it’s bad for the environment and everything? It seems kinda hypocritical right, because they’re kind of, like, one of those ‘clean eating’ restaurant things. I keep thinking that I should bring my own reusable straw, because I’m trying to, like, reduce waste and be more environmentally friendly, but I always forget…” Megan took another hasty sip of her smoothie and then choked on it, before trailing off into silence again.  
What the hell was she talking about? Why was she acting so weird? Shay stared vacantly at her in confusion for a few seconds before she realised that they were both equally lost for words. Conversation used to flow so naturally between them, but right now the atmosphere was so tense and uncomfortable. It had been a long time since they last talked.  
“Oh, yeah...” Shay trailed off, trying to force a smile. Ugh. There was no use trying to pretend like this was normal, so she steeled herself and asked: “Okay, Megs, what’s really up? As much as I love talking about plastic straws, or whatever, I know you didn’t just bring me all the way out here for that.”  
“Nothing,” she replied, staring down into her drink. Her voice sounded strangely high-pitched. “I just wanted to chill. We haven’t seen each other in a while.”  
“Yeah, well… I thought you decided you never wanted to see me again.” Shay tried to keep the accusation out of her tone, but it was incredibly hard not to sound resentful when you were confronting the girl that ghosted you for three months straight. Megan’s face fell. “I totally understand why!” Shay added swiftly. “What I did to you and Marlon was really, really fucked up. But you made it pretty clear you didn’t want anything to do with me anymore.”

Those first few days in limbo after Megan had confronted her had been excruciating. The guilt had almost eaten Shay alive. All she did was spend hours upon hours lying completely numb on her bed, absolutely disgusted with herself for betraying someone she cared so deeply about and then straight up lying to her face about the reasons why. And above all she was consumed by the frantic, paralysing fear that she had destroyed her relationship with Megan forever. Then, at the end of year carnival she had started to feel a little bit better. For a while, it felt like Megan had forgiven her. But halfway through the night she disappeared abruptly and then proceeded to completely ignore Shay all summer. She had thought that their friendship was over. Obliterated. Destroyed. And now all of a sudden Megan was talking to her again like nothing had ever gone wrong. Shay didn’t know what to think.

“Well…” Megan seemed to shrink in her seat as she nibbled her bottom lip abashedly. “I did think that for a while, yeah. But it’s hard to just freeze someone out like that. We were really close, and I was still thinking about you a lot over the summer. I guess… I just missed you, Shay.”  
As Megan turned her deep brown eyes up towards her, Shay felt her breath hitch in her throat. She’d thought about her a lot. She’d _missed_ her. It was like torture, sitting here and listening helplessly to all the things she desperately wanted to hear when she _knew_ that Megan was one hundred percent straight. She’d never mean them in the way that Shay wanted her to.  
“Besides,” Megan continued, sitting up straighter. “As you know, I’ve been in your position before with all the drama I had with Abby. It’d be pretty hypocritical for me not to forgive you.”  
“Well, thanks,” Shay said softly. “And I really am sorry for what I did, Megs. I still feel terrible about it. And I know that doesn’t change anything, or whatever, but I hope you know that I’m sorry.”  
“I do.” This time her smile did reach her eyes, and they twinkled brightly as she met Shay’s gaze across the table. These kinds of little moments always caught Shay off guard. Most of the time Shay could repress her feelings and pretend they didn’t exist, but when Megan smiled like that she was totally helpless, because she really was dazzlingly beautiful.

After they’d gotten all of that out of the way, the conversation flowed easily again. It was back to  the way it used to be between them. They sat at that little table for ages after their drinks were long gone; chatting about school, gossiping about their friends, complaining about homework - no matter what they talked about, Shay was never bored when she was with Megan. But something still weighed heavily on the back of her mind. Because she could barely even make eye contact with Megan without vividly flashing back to memories of kissing her, and it was extremely distracting. God, it was driving her crazy! Neither of them had even mentioned Saturday night yet. Shay couldn’t stop thinking about the promise she made to Tyler, and she was on the edge of bringing it up a couple of times, but she just couldn’t force herself to talk about it out loud. Not when she’d only just made up with Megan, and not when they were having such a fun time otherwise. Saying something like that would just ruin the mood, and Megan probably didn’t even remember it, anyway. If she did, she certainly didn’t give any indication that it bothered her at all. So Shay stayed silent. There was no need to make things awkward between them  _ again _ , right? Besides, how would Megan react if she knew that Shay was fantasizing about kissing her? She’d probably be disgusted… Or scared, or angry. In her mind’s eye, Shay could picture the scene: Megan recoiling swiftly and looking at her with absolute repulsion in her eyes. Maybe she’d make a scathing comment, or maybe she’d just stay silent, but she definitely wouldn’t want anything to do with her anymore. The thought made Shay shudder involuntarily, and she tried desperately to push the surfacing memories of the kiss out of her mind. Why was it so hard for her to just be normal?

“Well,” Megan sighed, snapping Shay out of her silent internal conflict. “It’s getting late. I should probably get going, I’ve got so much homework to do. Ugh, junior year sucks.”  
“Are you actually gonna do any of it, though?” Shay teased slyly, grinning at her. “Isn’t that, like, your thing? Never doing schoolwork?”  
“Shut up.” Megan rolled her eyes, but smiled as she fished her car keys out of her bag. “So, I’m guessing you want a ride home?”    
“Oh, are you trying to find excuses to procrastinate?”  
“Or I can just leave you here…”   
“Okay, okay! Touchy subject, I guess,” Shay held her hands up in mock surrender as Megan sighed exaggeratedly. “But seriously, yes. Thanks. I would like a ride home.”  
“Fine.” Megan stood up, swinging her bag onto her back. “Come on then, let’s get out of here.”

They’d been driving for almost ten minutes before Shay realised that Megan was going in the absolute wrong direction.  
“Oh shit!” she said in surprise.  
“What is it?” Megan enquired.  
“I guess I didn’t tell you, but I moved out… You’re driving to my _old_ place. I don’t live there anymore.”  
Megan pulled over so abruptly that Shay grabbed the sides of her seat in shock. “What?” she exclaimed, her eyes wide. “Since when did you move out of home?”  
“I don’t know, like, two months ago maybe,” Shay guessed roughly. She was surprised that Megan didn’t know already. They really hadn’t talked for a long time.  
“Oh my god, I can’t believe I didn’t even realise,” Megan mused, staring pensively out the front window. A hint of dejection lingered in her voice. She sounded disappointed in herself. “Where are you living now, then?”   
“I’m staying with my cousin right now. Hey, it’s actually only like, a few blocks away from your place.” Shay tried to make it seem like she was only casually realising this fact in the moment, but she wasn’t quite sure if she succeeded. Megan looked at her searchingly.  
“So you made me drive miles and miles in the wrong direction only to tell me we’re pretty much neighbours now? Huh?” She grinned, nudging Shay with her elbow playfully. “Are you trying to run up my gas bill or something, Shay?”  
“Uhh, sorry.” Shay toyed with her hair nervously but Megan just shrugged cheerfully.  
“That’s okay,” she responded jovially as she launched into a u-turn and sped off again. “You’re gonna have to give me directions, though.”

Shay guided Megan through the last few streets until they were finally parked out the front of Jacs’ red-brick apartment building.  
“So this is your new place, hey?” Megan commented as she twisted her head to peer up at it from the driver’s seat of her car. She nodded approvingly. “I’m sorry I didn’t know.”  
“Oh, it’s fine, it’s my fault for not telling you,” Shay exhaled quickly.  
“Yeah, well, I’m sorry we didn’t talk more. Over the summer.”  
“Right…” Shay trailed off. There was something about the far-off, thoughtful look in Megan’s eyes that made her stomach flutter nervously. “Well, thanks for the lift, Megs! I guess I’ll see you at school, or whatever.”  
She grabbed the handle of the door and was just about to get out of the car when she stopped in her tracks as Megan stammered: “Hey, Shay?”  
“Yeah?” She turned around slowly in her seat. The atmosphere was still and anticipatory, like there was some huge ass elephant in the room that neither of them really understood.  
“It was really nice to hang out with you today.” Megan spoke so softly and sweetly that Shay might have imagined her saying it, but at the same time her words seemed to carry some enormous, indescribable weight.  
“Oh…”  
Megan leaned forward and for a few starstruck seconds time seemed to move in slow motion. Shay froze as she panicked that Megan was going to kiss her again, but at the last minute she wrapped her arms around her in a hug. A nice, friendly, platonic hug. The kind of thing that good friends do all the time. Shay felt like kicking herself. Actually, the hug was starting to get kind of awkward - Megan was straining over from the driver’s seat and an uncomfortable gap stretched between their bodies - but Shay still felt all the muscles in her body tense reactively and she patted Megan on the back gingerly. When Megan finally broke away Shay gave her a wan smile.  
“Bye, Megan,” she said weakly as she opened the passenger door. Her breathing suddenly felt very shallow and she could hear her heartbeat acutely pounding in her ears.  
“See you later, Shaydee.”

Shay lingered on the curb and followed the path of Megan’s car with her gaze - it dwindled in size as she drove further down the road before disappearing completely when she turned a corner. The street was completely quiet now, and Shay let out a deep sigh. Spending a few hours alone with Megan was an emotional rollercoaster of Shakespearean proportions. Every time they saw each other, it felt like they were acting out their own little soap opera. She was so sick of all the suggestive pauses, all the cryptic exchanges, all the unsaid things flitting between them whenever she met Megan’s eyes. For once, why couldn’t things just be simple? There were so many conflicting feelings clouding up Shay’s consciousness right now that it would take hours to sort them all out. But as she trudged up the stairwell to her apartment, she pushed them to the back of her mind. It was better, and much easier for everyone, if she just ignored them. She had a tonne of homework to do, anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for your lovely comments, they seriously make me smile so much!
> 
> It will probably take me a bit longer to post the next update since I'm back at uni now and I'm actually trying to get good marks this semester. Don't do econometrics if you want lots of free time, hahaha. But I'll try to post longer chapters from here on in to make up for less updates! Thanks for reading <3


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